I'm Back, He's Free!

He had the famous catchphrase, she had the lovely legs. They used to
be on show week after week in the comedy series Are You Being
Served?
This week everyone's back and Wendy Richard can't wait, as Daphne
Lockyer reports:

Wendy Richard is undergoing a transformation.
Having arrived from a grueling morning working on the EastEnders
set, she's now being turned from the grumpy and slightly dumpy Pauline
Fowler, who she's played for the last seven years, into an altogether
more glamorous TV character.

A dash of lipstick here, a touch of blusher there and the all-important
falsies (eyelashes, that is) and the transformation is complete. Wendy
looks at herself and smiles with satisfaction. It isn't every day you
get to trade an image as down to earth as an Albert Square cuppa for
something as fizzy and dizzy as the champagne she's currently sipping.

Not that the soap actress is a bubble brain. Far from it. It's just that
she's about to go back to the role of the ultimate blonde airhead,
Shirley Brahms, in a long-awaited sequel to the comedy series Are
You Being Served?.

From January 3, the BBC sitcom Grace And Favour will favour us
with Wendy's considerable comedy talents . . . to say nothing of her
legs, which are causing quite a stir among BSkyB viewers and the
American public who are currently being treated to re-runs of the
original TV series.

"I get fan letters from people all the time saying how much the series
makes them hoot and how much they like my legs," the actress says.
"Let's
hope that since we made Are You Being Served? neither my legs,
nor the humour, have deteriorated.

"I think I can vouch for the humour, because when I first saw the
scripts for Grace And Favour I giggled just as much as I did
when I first read the ones for Are You Being Served?" Wendy
says. "There's something about that brand of seaside postcard humour
that makes me crack up. I'd have been heartbroken if they'd made the
series without me."

In this series, the cast, which includes all the old regulars like John
Inman and Molly Sugden, get up to their usual hilarious antics -- Miss
Brahms even has to milk a cow! What appealed most to Wendy about it was
that despite the intervening decade, the characters remained the same.
Miss Brahms, for example, is still a Miss after a failed romance with an
amusement arcade owner from Newport Pagnell.

As for the setting -- it may now be a hotel (left to the characters in
Mr. Grace's will), instead of Grace Bros. department store, but says
Wendy: "The whole feel of the series is just as it was. It's like
bumping into an old friend you haven't seen for years and realising that
everything between you is still just the same as ever."

There were similar feelings, too, about acting with the same cast.
"Don't forget that we all worked together for 12 years," Wendy points
out. "John and I have been best friends ever since the first series.
We're constantly at each other's houses and if he's in panto I go to see
him, and vice versa.

"Molly (Sugden), too, I've seen whenever I've been able to. And all the
others I've at the very least sent Christmas cards to."

It doesn't take long to work out that Wendy cleaves to the familiar --
whether it's people or parts. "I'm not a person who gets bored with my
friends -- most of whom I've known for years -- or with the parts I've
played," she explains. "Otherwise I couldn't have been Miss Brahms for
12 years and Pauline for seven."

Not that it's been easy juggling the two roles When Wendy first signed
up for EastEnders she had an understanding with the show's
producer that if another series of Are You Being Served? were
made she'd be allowed to take part. "But time-wise it's been very
grueling to do both," she says.

During the filming of Grace And Favour, Wendy was working 12
hours a day, seven days a week. "It doesn't leave much time for a home
life," she says.

In spite of two other unsuccessful marriages, Wendy remains optimistic
about the years ahead with the man she married two years ago.
"Let's
just say I'm a lot more sensible now than I was when I was , say, 20.
Life's for learning and I've learned a lot."

Among the lessons -- if she ever needed to learn it -- is that, by and
large, the showbusiness world has as much depth as a puddle. It's
perhaps for this reason that she has married someone outside the
business -- Paul works as a carpet fitter. "We started seeing each other
after he went to lay a carpet in a friend's house." Wendy smiles.

Unlike other stars, Wendy tends to shun glitzy do's in favour of a quiet
time with Paul at one of their two homes either in central London or
down by the sea in East Sussex.

"I'm not one of those actresses who think that real life is something
they do at work. I know that real life is what you leave behind when you
go out in the morning and slam the front door," she says.

In truth, the way Wendy tells it, what she leaves behind sounds like a
very cosy set up. On her precious rare days off she cooks or does
tapestry, while Paul tends to his rose garden. Often they can be seen
walking their dog (called Shirley Brahms) on the beach.

To add to all this there are also the visits from Paul's three children
by his first marriage.

"They're the kind of kids you'd be proud to call your own," says Wendy
with just a trace of sorrow that she's never been a mother herself.
"Sometimes I do regret it, and other times I think I probably wouldn't
have been able to take advantage of all my opportunities if I'd had
children. Either way, it simply didn't happen, and I just have to accept
that," she says.

It was Wendy's mother who first saw her daughter's acting potential and
sent her to stage school. And one of Wendy's few regrets is that her mum
and dad didn't live to see her success.

"There again," she says,
"my mum did at least get a taste of it. Shortly
before she died I'd had a cameo role in a film starring Albert Finney
and I took her to the Odean Leicester Square when there was a picture of
me up in lights. She was thrilled to bits."

Though Wendy has been in the business for more years than she cares to
remember, she still fells the thrill of success. "I still get a kick out
of hearing an audience clap or getting a letter from a viewer," she
says. "In fact, I still thank the Lord for all the wonderful things in
my life."

Chief among these is Paul and last year they celebrated their marriage
with a trip to Australia, Hawaii and Singapore.

"I remember Paul saying that he never dreamed he'd ever have a holiday
like that. And the truth is, if I look back, I don't suppose I did
either -- which is why I still count my blessings."

In other words, Wendy still views her success as a kind of gift from
above. She -- more than anyone -- knows the meaning of the phrase Grace
And Favour.